IN THIS ISSUE:
Learning and Knowing is NOT Doing
History, Geography ... Whatever
You Say Verbatim, I Say Verboten
Disregarding What We Already 'Know'
Completing a Thought
Fading Away ...
AND FINALLY - Following up on Internet protection
Learning and Knowing is NOT Doing
As an athlete growing up, I 'learned' the importance of warming-up and stretching (not to even mention "staying in shape"). I 'know' that, especially as one's calendar collection grows, one has to take even greater care to make sure that one adequately warms-up and stretches before engaging in any kind of exercise.
I learned that. I know that.
Monday night my friend Leslie called and pleaded with me to play on her co-ed softball team to preclude them from having to forfeit a tournament game. I somewhat reluctantly, somewhat expectantly, agreed. Cutting to the chase .... (or should I say, pulling to the chase?) ... I didn't warm-up, I didn't stretch. My first at-bat I hit a meek grounder to third. I dug for first, my 26-year-old mind screaming, "Beat it out! Beat it out!". Halfway to first base, however (or was I still in the batter's box?), my 46-year-old right hamstring responded, "I don't think so ... DANGER, WILL ROBINSON! DANGER!". It pulled, popped, strained, sprained, or whatever the technical term is and almost made me fall face first in a humiliated pile.
Six days later I have a purple bruise occupying the back of my right leg from the top of my knee to just below where the sun don't shine that's bad enough to induce my daughter Stacy to emit an eye-covering, "Ewwwww!!!".
Is anybody getting the irony of this, coming on the Achilles heel of Chanticleer's last issue relating Stacy's lack of foresight in getting herself sunburned?
So what do you 'know' and what have you 'learned' that you're not 'doing'? (sigh)
After weeks of anticipation (picture the Heinz bottle with Carly singing if you're old enough - make sure you stretch adequately first) last week I finally got my "high-speed Internet access". I signed up with the new AT&T fixed wireless service. (http://www.iatt.net/, if you're interested) Two guys worked outside to get the antenna installed, while a computer tech came inside to install a network interface card in my computer and install the software. I talked with him for a few minutes while he was killing time, waiting on the outside guys to finish.
I asked him where their main office was.
He gave me a somewhat puzzled look, and responded, "Redmond? Is there a Redmond? I think it's Redmond. I don't know where that is. I don't really know my history."
Now, I admit that my first thought upon hearing that ("I don't really know my history") was, "Oh, my! Newsletter fodder!" But upon further review, I've been thinking about that. And I'm wondering ... what if somebody went through their entire life always confusing "history" with "geography"? On the one hand, that constitutes pretty basic 'knowledge' that "everyone ought to know". On the other hand, if you were in a conversation about where in California you could find the best vineyards and you said, "I don't know, I was poor in history", does that really denote any less 'knowledge' than just saying, "I don't know"?
Not knowing his "history" from his "geography" didn't prevent the guy from properly installing my NIC card, and getting the software up and running, and doing his job to get me high-speed access to the Internet.
You Say Verbatim, I Say Verboten
In his excellent, if unconventional, textbook Composing: Writing as a Self-Creating Process, William E. Coles, Jr. relates an anecdote about Charles Edward Garman while a student in the Yale Divinity School, circa 1872:
Wouldn't that capability satisfy most of what we, as parents and tax-paying employers of teachers, expect as evidence of performance, as 'proof' of 'education'? I'd bet you would know your "history" from your "geography".
And yet ... think about the dozens, hundreds or thousands of other means of 'learning' we (most of us) employ. We pridefully begin teaching our baby kids "what we know", and then we ship them off to schools so that other 'adults' can teach them "what they know" and "what the books say", and for the most part we obliviously ignore (or ignorantly remain oblivious to) the fact that kids 'learn' so very much more than what they are 'taught'. And then you reach 'our' age (pandering to the first standard deviation of my readership here) and it's like, "I need to take a course to learn about ME!"
Okay, so you go to Barnes and Noble and you read, and memorize, every book on the Self-Help, Self-Improvement shelves. You can answer any question that anybody can ask about what the authors say in all the books.
And what have you 'learned'?
Disregarding What We Already 'Know'
If this is true – and it seems inescapable
– then no education which consists mainly in the dissemination of “knowledge”
can save us. If men can disregard in their policies the facts they already
know, they can just as easily disregard new facts which they do not at
present know. What is needed is the development in men of that particular
type of skill which will enable them to make social use of knowledge already
in their possession; enable them to apply simple, sometimes self-evident,
truths to the guidance of their common life.
Completing a Thought
Driving to work the other day, I passed a shiny new black Volvo station wagon. I first noticed two young (3rd or 4th grade, I imagined) girls sitting in the "way back" seat, facing me as I pulled from behind them into the passing lane. (Okay, this is Texas ... the left passing lane.) Pulling alongside, I saw three more girls in the middle seat and one in the front seat. They all looked about the same age, and I noticed they seemed to be wearing school uniforms of the plaid skirt, white blouse variety. The Breck-hair in-between-Junior-League-meetings soccermomchauffeur drove while talking on a cell phone. A picture of surburban private school normality.
Something bothered me about this picture.
The 'something' resolved itself a few miles up the road. I remembered meeting my buddy Bill C. at Balls Hamburgers, near Midway and Northwest Hwy in Dallas, last fall for lunch. This area is somewhat near the Hockaday School, a well-known private 'old-school' girls school in Dallas. While we were there, I watched as two late-model cars drove up and parked together - one a BMW, the other a Mercedes. Three girls were in each. I noticed that, instead of getting out of their cars, they continued to sit while they each finished their cigarettes. Then all six sprang out and spritely walked into the restaurant, each almost indistinguishable from the other in their plaid skirts and white blouses.
Fading Away ...
While visiting my friend Bonnie in Houston a few weeks ago, she repeated some words that seemed wise to me. Paraphrasing, "Nothing in nature grows without shedding". This was said in the context of personal growth and development, the evolution of relationships, etc. But I wonder ... if it's an aphorism appropriate to nature ... and if it applies to individuals and relationships ... does it also apply to cultures, traditions, societies, institutions, etc.?
AND FINALLY - Following up on Internet protection
Fortuitously timed after the June 5th newsletter, the June 11th Dallas Morning News contained an editorial by Bart McKay, "an attoryney in the Internet and e-commerce group of the Dallas-based law firm Hughes & Luce." McKay informs us that "As part of the Child Online Protection Act of 1998, Congress created the 19-member Commission on Online Child Protection and charged it with studying various methods and technologies to reduce minors' access to harmful Internet material." Among the measures under consideration for inclusion in the commission's report (due out in November, according to McKay):
I read with interest the comments on the issue of pornography and the public libraries. When my son was 15, I asked my husband about what goes on with boys sexually at this age. He told me more than I wanted to know. I also religiously read Ann Landers and one day, she addressed the topic in a column. When I found a copy of Playboy Magazine, I almost died. Ann had said, "now if this happens, just put the magazine back where you found it and DO NOT SAY ANYTHING ABOUT IT!" That's exactly what I did. Case closed. For several days, I could hardly look at my son without experiencing total embarrassment. And then I forgot about the whole thing. One day, my son walked up to me and said, "Mom, I was wondering if it would be okay for me to SUBSCRIBE to Playboy". My mouth began spewing out these words, "No, son, because you have a little sister and she shouldn't be seeing such things around this house. She is just not mature enough." And guess what? IT WORKED. - a Texas mother
As regards children and pornography, the questions asked by the author
in the respective article do not adequately address the issue: children
have a developing sexuality; subject to imprinting. Many of the
fetishes which both positively and negatively impact adult sexuality
arise from early, unintentional imprinting.
Interestingly, Japanese culture along with its strict codes of behavior
regarding sexuality and pornography also has a long tradition of erotic
fetishism. An entire industry has arisen which serves the fetishistic
interests of Japanese businessmen in a non-explicit manner. This often
involves "theme" bars in which the hostesses wear a costume and behave
in ways to excite the fetish of the patrons. This practice rarely
involves sexual conduct or explicit sexual behavior. Rather, it fuels
the libido which the patron supposedly takes home and expresses in
culturally acceptable and personally respectful ways with his spouse.
It seems, whether in a sexually liberal or in a sexually repressive
culture, fetishism arises. Rightfully or wrongfully, productively or
counter-productively, consciously or subconsciouly, those who attempt to
limit the exposure of children to pornography do so in order to protect
their children's developing sexuality from any confusion which might
interfere with sexual happiness as adults. The character of that
protection varies from culture to culture, sometimes expressing itself
in wonderous and mysterious ways; and still, the intent to regulate
developing sexuality seems universal amongst all cultures, including
those which tolerate sexual behavior nominally abhorrent to western
european sensibilities, such as child prostitution. - Ken in Bend, OR
In reference to your "Yeah 'RIGHT'!" comment in regards to the story on filtering out Internet pornography in Holland, Michigan [in which a mother claimed that "pornographic pictures started popping up on the screen" while on the library's Internet] ... Actually that just happened to me. I wanted to book a trip to Belize. Often when I don't have the exact web address, I guess the site name. Type in the address www.elitetravel.com and tell me what you see. - Gary in Plano [Chanticleer belize you, Gary, and recommends that readers don't try this at work. Stacy, don't even think about it.]
Early in the session ... Professor Fisher asked us to read fifty pages in his book, The Beginnings of Christianity, and the next day called on Garman to recite first. Garman began with the first line and went through to the end of the hour verbatim et literatim.
Think about that. Think about ... what if, as a student ... you could memorize everything that you read? How well do you think you would do on tests? How well do you think you would do on standardized tests, like the SAT and ACT?
If the world has nearly destroyed
itself, it is not from lack of knowledge in the sense that we lack the
knowledge to cure cancer or release atomic energy, but is due to the fact
that the mass of men have not applied to public policy knowledge which
they already possess, which is indeed of almost universal possession, deducible
from the facts of everyday life.
What do you think about these measures? Are they reasonable? Would they be effective? Why? Why not?